Read the Ars Technica op-ed in today’s New York Times

Traditional landlines are dying.

Ars Technica writer Jon Brodkin, not content with confining his awesomeness to our virtual pages, this morning expanded into both the online and print editions of The New York Times with an op-ed on the impending death of traditional copper landlines. Called "When the Landline Is a Lifeline," his piece looks at the "network compact" encoded in the old system of wires and home phones and what could be lost as we move forward.

AT&T and Verizon are pushing hard to shift traditional landline service, which has mostly operated over copper lines, to a system of Internet-based phones by around 2020. If the Federal Communications Commission approves the switch as is, it could come as a shock to the 96 million Americans who still rely on landlines.

The change itself is inevitable: the old copper lines are aging and expensive to maintain. And the new system is already in use. As of December 2012, 42 million Americans had Internet-based phones. But moving to an all Internet-based network will benefit Americans only if the F.C.C. is able to protect them in the shift.

The new phones have some major technical flaws. They can’t hold up during long power failures or connect all emergency phone calls. But there are also regulatory problems: The change in service could free the telecom industry from its obligation to guarantee universal access and fair prices to consumers.

Though length limitations means the piece can't dig deep into the details, it's a nice overview of the flashpoints that could surround the transition as it takes hold across the country. Give it a read—then pass it along to a friend or family member who has no idea that the issue even exists.

If you want even further details on the subject, the Brodkin back catalog offers some good related reading:

Promoted Comments

TCP/IP can't be as reliable as TDM. Ever. We can make it pretty reliable, but there are limits. It's just not what it is.

I'm assuming you mean packet-based switching vs TDM?

Packet switching could be made as stable ad TDM, but it would require massive overbuilding of infrastructure.

I'm also assuming you're meaning TDM with some form of circuit based routing as to have minimum guarantees.

TDM does not scale as well as switching. The issue will become, do we want minimum guarantees, but can only support 5mil users at a time, or do we want best-effort, can support 1bil users at a time, but crumbles when 1.1bil users attempt to use at the same time.

Old style phone circuit based routing essentially made it so *if* you could get through, it worked great, but you still had the issue of a swarm of users suddenly causing all circuits to be busy for hours on end.

In this day-and-age, it's kind of scary leaving out critical emergency communications up to the whim of greedy corps that regularly have congestion, not to mention potential DDOS attacks that are are to ignore.

What I find most interesting is the fact most of the 42m Americans that have Voip don't even know about it.

Cox communications will sell you a 'landline' for $10 a month - all it is is a Motorola HFC modem with a UPS.The battery inside is good for a couple of hours after which your 'lifeline' is as good as dead.

All this assumes that ALL the pieces of the remaining (internet) infrastructure remain functional.VERY different from a pair of wires going form your house all the way to the bullet-proof telco facility.

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

How, and who's paying for it?

The space requirement alone for the PSTN equipment are enormous, as are the HVAC costs. You ever want to see people freak out, cut the HVAC at a CO and watch people prioritize what to shut down first.

yep

i've seen the old Nortel DMS switches and their Lucent counterparts. HUGE. figure about a few hundred square feet of floor space not including all the HVAC and everything else you need to keep it running. and it all can be replaced by one 1U server

Re-iterating here - no one is arguing to keep those outdated systems around. (well maybe some luddite types are, but that's not the argument here.)

The suggestion is that new technologies need to meet/exceed the capabilities of the previous tech, and that regulation needs to keep up to ensure that happens. This includes emergency/disaster coverage.

The communications infrastructure is a vital component of the economic and social well-being of our nation, it is important that we ensure it is not degraded to suit the profits of the telcos at the expense of everyone else.

Speaking as a former telecommunications field engineer (from the 80's when I was involved in a lot of the changeover from copper pairs/racks/rotary switches that filled entire floors being replaced by a single rack or two of fiber), I gotta say that the advancement of tech is great, but there is no real replacement for the reliability under duress of the POTS (plain old telephone system.) At least not yet.

Every time I hear of a local exchange carrier saying they don't want to repair or maintain those twisted pairs of copper and the reliable (massive battery and generator backed) service that the POTS provides, my heart sinks a little. Cell phones are no replacement. The first thing that the cell system does in emergencies when everyone is trying to use it is to essentially fail. I've experienced that time and again.

Fiber and VOIP are the future for reliable home telecommunications, but this system *must* be treated in the same way as the telco common carriers. It must be reasonably affordable, it must be available everywhere, and there *must be* reliable back up power that can last for days on end, not for minutes or hours. Your regular POTS phone works when the power is out because it's powered by the line which is powered by the telco. A system that doesn't work when the power fails isn't much of a system.

What I find most interesting is the fact most of the 42m Americans that have Voip don't even know about it.

Cox communications will sell you a 'landline' for $10 a month - all it is is a Motorola HFC modem with a UPS.The battery inside is good for a couple of hours after which your 'lifeline' is as good as dead.

All this assumes that ALL the pieces of the remaining (internet) infrastructure remain functional.VERY different from a pair of wires going form your house all the way to the bullet-proof telco facility.

Congratulations, Jon. I love reading all of your articles chronicling the abuse the American people suffer at the hands of these wretched telecommunications companies.. and commenting in a frothy rage about said abuses.

Congratulations, Jon. I love reading all of your articles chronicling the abuse the American people suffer at the hands of these wretched telecommunications companies.. and commenting in a frothy rage about said abuses.

What I find most interesting is the fact most of the 42m Americans that have Voip don't even know about it.

Cox communications will sell you a 'landline' for $10 a month - all it is is a Motorola HFC modem with a UPS.The battery inside is good for a couple of hours after which your 'lifeline' is as good as dead.

All this assumes that ALL the pieces of the remaining (internet) infrastructure remain functional.VERY different from a pair of wires going form your house all the way to the bullet-proof telco facility.

LOL

the CO is pretty bullet proof (quite literally in some parts of LA where they had to install Kevlar panels into the building's facade), but your copper pair is remarkably susceptible to backhoe fade. Also, falling pole fade, errant trencher fade, I-didn't-call-before-digging fade, Oh there's a MW shot in this run and someone parked a crane in between, etc etc etc.

I kept a landline for a long time for that sort of thing, and also because I am a stubborn bastard who grew up on circuit-switched networks. I've punched down enough copper pair to last me a lifetime, and if I never see the inside of a splice case again it'll be too soon. That being said, the assumption that central battery phones are somehow ultra-resistant to natural disaster is a joke. They are resistant to electrical outages, but that's about it.

What I find most interesting is the fact most of the 42m Americans that have Voip don't even know about it.

Cox communications will sell you a 'landline' for $10 a month - all it is is a Motorola HFC modem with a UPS.The battery inside is good for a couple of hours after which your 'lifeline' is as good as dead.

All this assumes that ALL the pieces of the remaining (internet) infrastructure remain functional.VERY different from a pair of wires going form your house all the way to the bullet-proof telco facility.

LOL

the CO is pretty bullet proof (quite literally in some parts of LA where they had to install Kevlar panels into the building's facade), but your copper pair is remarkably susceptible to backhoe fade. Also, falling pole fade, errant trencher fade, I-didn't-call-before-digging fade, Oh there's a MW shot in this run and someone parked a crane in between, etc etc etc.

I kept a landline for a long time for that sort of thing, and also because I am a stubborn bastard who grew up on circuit-switched networks. I've punched down enough copper pair to last me a lifetime, and if I never see the inside of a splice case again it'll be too soon. That being said, the assumption that central battery phones are somehow ultra-resistant to natural disaster is a joke. They are resistant to electrical outages, but that's about it.

Considering power loss is immediate consequence of ANY disaster I'd say it's a pretty big difference.

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

How, and who's paying for it?

The space requirement alone for the PSTN equipment are enormous, as are the HVAC costs. You ever want to see people freak out, cut the HVAC at a CO and watch people prioritize what to shut down first.

I know, it's terrible, the CEO of Comcast/AT&T/Verizon/et al will not be able to buy a new yacht every year to go with his new island every year. He'll have to settle for once every two years instead. The horrors. Heaven forbid that a fundamental and necessary infrastructure require that those allowed to profit off of their captured audience actually do something to make it worthwhile for the people. I mean, I guess we could just nationalize it and have it run far more efficiently by the Government or set up a model similar to any of the countries that have faster, better, and cheaper internet then we do - though we invented the damn technology.

In other words, they have been granted the right to make a system necessary for the functioning of our civilization private and inefficient so they can make butt loads of money. I don't really care if they make one butt load less this year then the year before. They have a monopoly and can just shut up and enjoy their profits.

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

in my 30 some years in NYC i have lost power only one time during the blackout in 2002 or 2003twice if you live close to the water and got hit by Sandyand last i checked, 911 calls on cell phones get priority on cell networks

i've had time warner cable since 2003 and my service has gone out once or twice. i don't think the phone service had ever gone out though.

i know people who still pay for landlines and i don't understand the protections they get that i don't. for rural people, i don't see why they can't pay for their own infrastructure. they are the ones who always vote people in who pay lip service to less taxes and less government

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

How, and who's paying for it?

The space requirement alone for the PSTN equipment are enormous, as are the HVAC costs. You ever want to see people freak out, cut the HVAC at a CO and watch people prioritize what to shut down first.

yep

i've seen the old Nortel DMS switches and their Lucent counterparts. HUGE. figure about a few hundred square feet of floor space not including all the HVAC and everything else you need to keep it running. and it all can be replaced by one 1U server

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

in my 30 some years in NYC i have lost power only one time during the blackout in 2002 or 2003twice if you live close to the water and got hit by Sandyand last i checked, 911 calls on cell phones get priority on cell networks

i've had time warner cable since 2003 and my service has gone out once or twice. i don't think the phone service had ever gone out though.

i know people who still pay for landlines and i don't understand the protections they get that i don't. for rural people, i don't see why they can't pay for their own infrastructure. they are the ones who always vote people in who pay lip service to less taxes and less government

What makes you think we don't pay for our infrastructure? We get a bill just like everyone else. As for the rest, glass houses.

But I'd like to challenge one of the unstated assumptions: that we, as a nation, want to provide high-reliability phone service below cost, to every American who wants it.

People who need medical device connectivity, Hell, yes! In the lottery of life, you never know when you, or your child, is going to need exceptional help to survive, and those of us who don't (now) need those wires ought to be happy to ensure that they're available to those who do.

And for sure, there ARE also people who live in rural areas because they cannot afford city prices. I would argue that for most, a landline is the least of their needs: they probably want more for food, clothing and access to appropriate medical care. A rifle-shot program to give them a phone, possibly at high expense, seems a distraction.

But many people live in remote areas out of personal choice to be removed from the same contact with society that the rest of us have to pay extra to give them. If you live in remote Idaho by choice (as a former biz partner did), you don't plan to call the non-existent neighbors to send your kids home for dinner. You're not concerned about calling the police about a noise in your backyard, nor the EMTs because your heartburn is acting up again. For these people, the guaranteed access program is an expensive substitute that they implicitly don't care much about. At a time when US infrastructure is in much worse shape than I'd like, it directs us to invest in the least-valuable places. Why?

Maybe there are reasons why we, as a society, want to foist this older technology onto people who seemingly care little about it. But more likely, this is a program that has accomplished its purpose, of preventing a monopoly from exploiting Americans who were largely rural when it was put into place. I think it's time to find a more effective way of meeting Americans' technological needs.

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

How, and who's paying for it?

The space requirement alone for the PSTN equipment are enormous, as are the HVAC costs. You ever want to see people freak out, cut the HVAC at a CO and watch people prioritize what to shut down first.

yep

i've seen the old Nortel DMS switches and their Lucent counterparts. HUGE. figure about a few hundred square feet of floor space not including all the HVAC and everything else you need to keep it running. and it all can be replaced by one 1U server

Re-iterating here - no one is arguing to keep those outdated systems around. (well maybe some luddite types are, but that's not the argument here.)

The suggestion is that new technologies need to meet/exceed the capabilities of the previous tech, and that regulation needs to keep up to ensure that happens. This includes emergency/disaster coverage.

The communications infrastructure is a vital component of the economic and social well-being of our nation, it is important that we ensure it is not degraded to suit the profits of the telcos at the expense of everyone else.

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

in my 30 some years in NYC i have lost power only one time during the blackout in 2002 or 2003twice if you live close to the water and got hit by Sandyand last i checked, 911 calls on cell phones get priority on cell networks

i've had time warner cable since 2003 and my service has gone out once or twice. i don't think the phone service had ever gone out though.

i know people who still pay for landlines and i don't understand the protections they get that i don't. for rural people, i don't see why they can't pay for their own infrastructure. they are the ones who always vote people in who pay lip service to less taxes and less government

What makes you think we don't pay for our infrastructure? We get a bill just like everyone else. As for the rest, glass houses.

the USF doesn't pay for phone service in cities and their suburbs

and everyone is always complaining how they can only get like 1mbps internet in rural areas. no one is going to spend thousands of $$$ to run wires to your home in the middle of no where for $100 a month in revenue

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

in my 30 some years in NYC i have lost power only one time during the blackout in 2002 or 2003twice if you live close to the water and got hit by Sandyand last i checked, 911 calls on cell phones get priority on cell networks

i've had time warner cable since 2003 and my service has gone out once or twice. i don't think the phone service had ever gone out though.

i know people who still pay for landlines and i don't understand the protections they get that i don't. for rural people, i don't see why they can't pay for their own infrastructure. they are the ones who always vote people in who pay lip service to less taxes and less government

What makes you think we don't pay for our infrastructure? We get a bill just like everyone else. As for the rest, glass houses.

Not to mention those of us that don't have cell service where they live. Like here at my house right now.

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

How, and who's paying for it?

The space requirement alone for the PSTN equipment are enormous, as are the HVAC costs. You ever want to see people freak out, cut the HVAC at a CO and watch people prioritize what to shut down first.

I know, it's terrible, the CEO of Comcast/AT&T/Verizon/et al will not be able to buy a new yacht every year to go with his new island every year. He'll have to settle for once every two years instead. The horrors. Heaven forbid that a fundamental and necessary infrastructure require that those allowed to profit off of their captured audience actually do something to make it worthwhile for the people. I mean, I guess we could just nationalize it and have it run far more efficiently by the Government or set up a model similar to any of the countries that have faster, better, and cheaper internet then we do - though we invented the damn technology.

In other words, they have been granted the right to make a system necessary for the functioning of our civilization private and inefficient so they can make butt loads of money. I don't really care if they make one butt load less this year then the year before. They have a monopoly and can just shut up and enjoy their profits.

Edit: Fixed a typo.

I was going to respond constructively, but then I got to the part about nationalizing the PSTN and having it run far more efficiently by the government and I just couldn't.

You really have no idea what you're talking about. None. NONE.

Paying the CEO nothing wouldn't change the costs of the equipment one damn bit, and it is expensive to buy, it's expensive to install, it's expensive to operate, and it's expensive to maintain.

And might I remind you that the government *has* already nationalized the telcos once, and that it was a private individual and then a private company that invented all this stuff you're talking about? TCP/IP was DARPA and NSF perfected it, but ethernet was DIX and the TDM PSTN has always been private from Alexander Graham Bell on.

A lot will be said here on the technological issues. But I am helping to build a 'temple' in NJ, and one of the requirements for us to get a preliminary (or temporary) Occupancy Certificate is having the security system in place be able to dial up 911 (oversimplification - but you get the idea). The local township regulations have no mention of VOIP. We have fiber dropped to our curb. But for this particular purpose, we are extending an existing copper line to the new building - for an additional 2-year contract charge of about $720. Not much in the big scheme of things, but having local regulations catch up to the 21st century should be a part of this discussion, IMHO.

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

How, and who's paying for it?

The space requirement alone for the PSTN equipment are enormous, as are the HVAC costs. You ever want to see people freak out, cut the HVAC at a CO and watch people prioritize what to shut down first.

yep

i've seen the old Nortel DMS switches and their Lucent counterparts. HUGE. figure about a few hundred square feet of floor space not including all the HVAC and everything else you need to keep it running. and it all can be replaced by one 1U server

Re-iterating here - no one is arguing to keep those outdated systems around. (well maybe some luddite types are, but that's not the argument here.)

The suggestion is that new technologies need to meet/exceed the capabilities of the previous tech, and that regulation needs to keep up to ensure that happens. This includes emergency/disaster coverage.

The communications infrastructure is a vital component of the economic and social well-being of our nation, it is important that we ensure it is not degraded to suit the profits of the telcos at the expense of everyone else.

TCP/IP can't be as reliable as TDM. Ever. We can make it pretty reliable, but there are limits. It's just not what it is.

Traditional landlines were dying five years ago, four years ago, three years ago, two years ago, a year ago, and still dying this year. Next year, I have no doubt that someone somewhere will write an article telling the world that "Traditional landlines are dying."

Two years ago when I was a senior in high school I recall rushing home so Verizon could "fix" the issue with our landline(Noise on the line, it was down 98% of the time). When the truck would come into town, the techs would hang out in the truck for about two hours, they did this once a week for about a year. Eventually they proposed the fix that I had to rush home to allow the guy in. Low and behold, he installed a little modem and router type thing, then hooked our RJ-11 line from the phone to it.

It's interesting that it was cheaper to pay the techs to sit around for two hours a week for a year, then pay this guy to come install the wireless VOIP thing then it was to just maintain the lines. I spent a good hour talking to the tech who installed the VOIP stuff about it.

On a side note, the call quality from the new set up is absolutely terrible. Sounds like a baby hyena howling from hunger pains in the middle of a sub saharan sand storm.

The new phones have some major technical flaws. They can’t hold up during long power failures or connect all emergency phone calls.

This is important. We had floods throughout the city last summer that left many without power for days. Land lines were the only communication method that still worked after the first day.

Cell phone service doesn't do you any good when you can't recharge the phone, or the towers don't have power.

in the NYC blackout i heard that verizon lost power in some of their central offices and wasn't able to provide service

lots of areas lost phone service during sandy when the flood came. you can build the CO on a hill but if the water gets into the pipes, it can destroy the wiring. and even then unless you have one of the old style corded phones you need electricity to talk on the phone

... That being said, the assumption that central battery phones are somehow ultra-resistant to natural disaster is a joke. They are resistant to electrical outages, but that's about it.

Always seemed magical to me how the phone worked with no electricity. Most often power would go out. Sometimes phone as well, though. Sometimes phone became broken on a sunny day. Actually, both power and phone and all that seem more reliable than they used to be.

While phone seemed more reliable, the popularity of cordless phones put a dent in that reliability. To take advantage of the bullet proof nature of phone, a nasty old corded phone is required. At the time, people worried about cordless phones in an emergency. Yeah, the charge remaining in the cordless phone could be conserved but not much different from some systems with UPS now. So, copper service had its own troubles. People warning others to get off the phone in a thunderstorm even if the phone was cordless... People living on the edge with that cordless convenience.

When 'ringer off' switches (a selling point) on your Own phone and being able to literally unplug the phone from the wall were neat things. 'Take the phone in your room'. No more off the hook 'bah-bah-bah' that did finally stop regardless of the movie fallacy.

The new phones have some major technical flaws. They can’t hold up during long power failures or connect all emergency phone calls.

This is important. We had floods throughout the city last summer that left many without power for days. Land lines were the only communication method that still worked after the first day.

Cell phone service doesn't do you any good when you can't recharge the phone, or the towers don't have power.

in the NYC blackout i heard that verizon lost power in some of their central offices and wasn't able to provide service

lots of areas lost phone service during sandy when the flood came. you can build the CO on a hill but if the water gets into the pipes, it can destroy the wiring. and even then unless you have one of the old style corded phones you need electricity to talk on the phone

If it's common battery and the CO loses power, then you have no phone. COs are required to have at least 8 hour batteries and generators. All your transmission equipment is in there too, so if you lose a CO then other folks who count on your transport (*cough*cell phone companies*cough*) are affected as well.

The new phones have some major technical flaws. They can’t hold up during long power failures or connect all emergency phone calls.

This is important. We had floods throughout the city last summer that left many without power for days. Land lines were the only communication method that still worked after the first day.

Cell phone service doesn't do you any good when you can't recharge the phone, or the towers don't have power.

in the NYC blackout i heard that verizon lost power in some of their central offices and wasn't able to provide service

lots of areas lost phone service during sandy when the flood came. you can build the CO on a hill but if the water gets into the pipes, it can destroy the wiring. and even then unless you have one of the old style corded phones you need electricity to talk on the phone

We didn't have that problem, but flooding is not the only natural disaster that can befall major metropolitan areas. And yes, anyone expecting to use PSTN as an emergency communication method should hold onto their corded phone. I certainly have.

this is why internet is so expensive, some of these companies use the profits from their ISP business to pay for the legacy money losing telephone business

old people can get a cell phone with unlimited minutes for like $20 or $30 a month. less than a traditional phone line

No, no one is arguing for keeping old technology around.

Jon is instead arguing for retaining the legal protections offered to the consumer even when switching to new technology, and also finding ways to keep some of the significant advantages of the old technology around with the new technology.

How, and who's paying for it?

The space requirement alone for the PSTN equipment are enormous, as are the HVAC costs. You ever want to see people freak out, cut the HVAC at a CO and watch people prioritize what to shut down first.

yep

i've seen the old Nortel DMS switches and their Lucent counterparts. HUGE. figure about a few hundred square feet of floor space not including all the HVAC and everything else you need to keep it running. and it all can be replaced by one 1U server

Re-iterating here - no one is arguing to keep those outdated systems around. (well maybe some luddite types are, but that's not the argument here.)

The suggestion is that new technologies need to meet/exceed the capabilities of the previous tech, and that regulation needs to keep up to ensure that happens. This includes emergency/disaster coverage.

The communications infrastructure is a vital component of the economic and social well-being of our nation, it is important that we ensure it is not degraded to suit the profits of the telcos at the expense of everyone else.

TCP/IP can't be as reliable as TDM. Ever. We can make it pretty reliable, but there are limits. It's just not what it is.

I would suggest that there are many other ways to do packet switched networks that are not TCP/IP. TCP is not well suited to streams that involve consistent, repeated, packets, things like RTP/RTCP, SCTP (not to be confused with scalable TCP STCP) or SST look to provide a more robust protocol which fits reliable voice traffic.

This is why VoLTE uses RTP/RTCP for transmission protocol, and SIP for signalling, with a driving goal of providing call service reliability equivalent to CSFB currently used.

But I'd like to challenge one of the unstated assumptions: that we, as a nation, want to provide high-reliability phone service below cost, to every American who wants it.

People who need medical device connectivity, Hell, yes! In the lottery of life, you never know when you, or your child, is going to need exceptional help to survive, and those of us who don't (now) need those wires ought to be happy to ensure that they're available to those who do.

And for sure, there ARE also people who live in rural areas because they cannot afford city prices. I would argue that for most, a landline is the least of their needs: they probably want more for food, clothing and access to appropriate medical care. A rifle-shot program to give them a phone, possibly at high expense, seems a distraction.

But many people live in remote areas out of personal choice to be removed from the same contact with society that the rest of us have to pay extra to give them. If you live in remote Idaho by choice (as a former biz partner did), you don't plan to call the non-existent neighbors to send your kids home for dinner. You're not concerned about calling the police about a noise in your backyard, nor the EMTs because your heartburn is acting up again. For these people, the guaranteed access program is an expensive substitute that they implicitly don't care much about. At a time when US infrastructure is in much worse shape than I'd like, it directs us to invest in the least-valuable places. Why?

Maybe there are reasons why we, as a society, want to foist this older technology onto people who seemingly care little about it. But more likely, this is a program that has accomplished its purpose, of preventing a monopoly from exploiting Americans who were largely rural when it was put into place. I think it's time to find a more effective way of meeting Americans' technological needs.

* Not affiliated with or especially a fan of any phone company!

Agreed. If someone wants to live far from civilization, it's not at all obvious why civilization should subsidize that lifestyle to give these people all the features of modern life. They're choosing to live in a way that is space and energy inefficient, that requires extraordinary expense in order to provide basic utilities. Why subsidize this? They don't have to live this way.

But I'd like to challenge one of the unstated assumptions: that we, as a nation, want to provide high-reliability phone service below cost, to every American who wants it.

People who need medical device connectivity, Hell, yes! In the lottery of life, you never know when you, or your child, is going to need exceptional help to survive, and those of us who don't (now) need those wires ought to be happy to ensure that they're available to those who do.

And for sure, there ARE also people who live in rural areas because they cannot afford city prices. I would argue that for most, a landline is the least of their needs: they probably want more for food, clothing and access to appropriate medical care. A rifle-shot program to give them a phone, possibly at high expense, seems a distraction.

But many people live in remote areas out of personal choice to be removed from the same contact with society that the rest of us have to pay extra to give them. If you live in remote Idaho by choice (as a former biz partner did), you don't plan to call the non-existent neighbors to send your kids home for dinner. You're not concerned about calling the police about a noise in your backyard, nor the EMTs because your heartburn is acting up again. For these people, the guaranteed access program is an expensive substitute that they implicitly don't care much about. At a time when US infrastructure is in much worse shape than I'd like, it directs us to invest in the least-valuable places. Why?

Maybe there are reasons why we, as a society, want to foist this older technology onto people who seemingly care little about it. But more likely, this is a program that has accomplished its purpose, of preventing a monopoly from exploiting Americans who were largely rural when it was put into place. I think it's time to find a more effective way of meeting Americans' technological needs.

* Not affiliated with or especially a fan of any phone company!

Agreed. If someone wants to live far from civilization, it's not at all obvious why civilization should subsidize that lifestyle to give these people all the features of modern life. They're choosing to live in a way that is space and energy inefficient, that requires extraordinary expense in order to provide basic utilities. Why subsidize this? They don't have to live this way.

That's OK PB, just remember that argument cuts both ways when the issue of feeding cities comes up.

and i bet that comcast, time warner, FIOS and everyone else has batteries and generators in their colocations and data centers

Yes, BUT the complexity of a VOIP network is levels of magnitude away from a pair of wires.1. You need power at the house2. You need power at HFC node3. You need power at Fiber termination facility in the CO4. Finally you need power where POTS hoops up to fiber.

1-3 aren't needed with POTS, + we are just talking about power, let alone software and other complexities of VOIP.

But I'd like to challenge one of the unstated assumptions: that we, as a nation, want to provide high-reliability phone service below cost, to every American who wants it.

People who need medical device connectivity, Hell, yes! In the lottery of life, you never know when you, or your child, is going to need exceptional help to survive, and those of us who don't (now) need those wires ought to be happy to ensure that they're available to those who do.

And for sure, there ARE also people who live in rural areas because they cannot afford city prices. I would argue that for most, a landline is the least of their needs: they probably want more for food, clothing and access to appropriate medical care. A rifle-shot program to give them a phone, possibly at high expense, seems a distraction.

But many people live in remote areas out of personal choice to be removed from the same contact with society that the rest of us have to pay extra to give them. If you live in remote Idaho by choice (as a former biz partner did), you don't plan to call the non-existent neighbors to send your kids home for dinner. You're not concerned about calling the police about a noise in your backyard, nor the EMTs because your heartburn is acting up again. For these people, the guaranteed access program is an expensive substitute that they implicitly don't care much about. At a time when US infrastructure is in much worse shape than I'd like, it directs us to invest in the least-valuable places. Why?

Maybe there are reasons why we, as a society, want to foist this older technology onto people who seemingly care little about it. But more likely, this is a program that has accomplished its purpose, of preventing a monopoly from exploiting Americans who were largely rural when it was put into place. I think it's time to find a more effective way of meeting Americans' technological needs.

* Not affiliated with or especially a fan of any phone company!

Agreed. If someone wants to live far from civilization, it's not at all obvious why civilization should subsidize that lifestyle to give these people all the features of modern life. They're choosing to live in a way that is space and energy inefficient, that requires extraordinary expense in order to provide basic utilities. Why subsidize this? They don't have to live this way.

That's OK PB, just remember that argument cuts both ways when the issue of feeding cities comes up.

Most of the people on farms and such aren't the main issue. This is the guy that has a cabin with a wood stove and a outhouse 50 miles from the nearest paved road... Or the people that live in places that you have to fly into. Or the person that just decides they like the mountains enough that they're willing to have a long commute just so their house has a really nice view. They're not shipping food to cities.

That's great and all, but it doesn't mean that everyone else has to help pay for their need to live without neighbors.